Blu-ray installed 'purely from a game design point of view'.

The guys over at GamePro were lucky enough to grab a few minutes with SCEE's main man Phil Harrison following a successful Tokyo Game Show for Sony this past weekend.

Harrison noted that there has been a significant improvement in the numerous PS3 games which were on show at TGS, but also stresses that the company is far from resting on its laurels, telling the interviewer: "…we've got a long way to go. I don't want anyone to walk out of here thinking that these games are 'it'. We're still tuning, improving, tweaking performance."

"i agree. Sony actually listens to their fans as well. Many were complaining about the double HDMI and whining about it so they got rid of it. Then some people started to whine about that, that sony promised us 2 HDMI when in fact, they were the ones who didnt want it. And now we have 2 HDMI outputs on the 60Gb model and 1 HDMI output on the 20Gb model which is a perfect solution if your company plans on releasing 2 SKU's

i also started wondering if phil harrison reads this forum

i was also glad to hear that the studios share technology, i believe it will help every company alot and will make the games much much better" - by A gamer

It seems every time I come to this forum the number of pre teens seems to increase. Maybe to shed some light on the subject of blu ray and hd dvd. It is inevitable that extra storage is needed history proves that, from cartridges, to cds, to dvds the developers will more than use the space.

Sony is killing two birds with one stone, the storage they need for games and a hd player, so I would really like to hear more than "Sony is pushing this new format down our throats." Sony is a corporation, so stop acting new.

The interview was informative and Phil answered most of my questions. He even answers your question about the inclusion of blu-ray and all you say is "he's lieing." You people are really contemptible, you would rather believe rumors, that have been proven wrong, then believe any statement made from the head of the company. They release a truly next generation console with components that may become the standard in the future so that you can be prepared and you whine. You say its too expensive even though they told you it would be the most expensive gaming machine two years ago. They show the potential of the ps3 and you bash it. There is no pleasing the few of you and its sad, because I can see the direction Sony is headed in and most that have chosen to purchase the ps3 can too.

i'm beginning to think that sony has no idea what its doing.... If the ps3 overheats playing ridgeracer on one display... how is it going to work on 2? anyhow, I also think its transparent that the bluray drive was not just installed for the gamers but because they want to push "their" format.

PS... if they are changing the models again then obviously they haven't begun manufacturing the system... I don't see how they get half a million made by november 17th

why should they care if it can fit on a DL-DVD when they have plenty of room on the blu-ray? You need to quit crying about every little thing. My god do you need a baby bottle or something to stop you from crying?

Also you always say that you want proof that this are like people say. Then I want Proof from you that "the makers of Resistance do lame programmming".

Prove it and not just your words I want a Link to a legit site saying that they are lame programers and if you can't provide a link to back up yourself then please stfu!

I don't think you can call the usage of all of a platforms forces as lame programming. Ofcourse they make use of the extra space available. They don't need to share textures or geometry between levels, giving the level designers absolute freedom.

If they had designed the game for the X360, they would probably have thought more about how to reuse art assets. Let's not forget what they were able to do with PS2.

The only reason blu-ray is in the ps3 is because they can't seem to sell the stand alone blu-ray players. Because the are double the price of HD-DVD and look half as good, sounds like a good deal to me NOT!!! And for the 22gb RFOM, they have to be sloppy programmers or they have a bunch of useless crap on the disc, 9gb is plenty for a high rez game, if you don't think so ask EPIC!!!

I like the fact that they are humble with the idea that blue-ray is for a gaming standpoint only. Specially when they keep saying that 100 plus blue-ray movies will be avaliable at ps3 launch and that many more will follow and that they keep on getting more and more support from movie companies for blue-ray material. yup good old only for games standpoint.

Seriously though it's for the format win. They never won one yet and that's leaving a sour taste in the mouth. I'd be doing the same thing. I like the idea of games that'll take that much space but they better use it wisely. Resistance better be huge having 22 gigs in there if not I'll be rather upset but I'll get over it. With 22 gigs+ I'm hoping to see a RPG last longer than a week. Which hasn't happened for a long long time (I'll point out FFX as the killer of long rpgs, could of happened before that but that's the one I can recall right now). Only because for some crazy idea devs and companies feel everything NEEDS to be on one disc.

ha, ha lol....first this guy says he doesn't want to sound arrogant, but then he tells us a bold face lie by saying that Blu-ray was put in PS3 for a "purely" games point of view, and then he has the nerve to try to make us believe that BD does not add anything to the cost of the PS3. WOW, that contradicts everything that I've heard before, even from Sony. It would have been just fine if he had said yes the BD did add to the price, but we felt that it was a neccessary risk because it good for the future of games and it will allow owners the ability for Blu-ray movie playback, which is a next gen HD format that we (Sony) is backing, but hey, I guess he's never heard that the "truth" will set you free. Well, its OK 'cause there's only one type of fan that believes them. uhm, mmmh Hey Sonyfanboys I'm selling "Majic Beans" 5k each, hurry up and get yours before I sell out!

I voted lame not because of the story, but because Sony is yet lying AGAIN! They installed blu-ray to trojan horse it into our homes in hope of setting the new next gen DVD standard! Only a fool would believe anything other than that!

jiggajayp, cause my computer was never supposed to get infected, but then just last month, i got trojan horsed. So your telling me that if theres a chance that anything can get a trojan horse, that it shouldnt be worth buying?, so whats the point of selling computers, and how is that that you are writing this stuff down, without a computer that cant have trojan horses. I have been a gamer for 10yrs, and nothing of mine has gotten a virus, so i think ur just full of it. The chance is possible, but highly unlikely cause i dont think sony would want their customers to go home with a 600 dollar system and then plug everything in and opps ive got a virus, there goes 600 bucks. Like cmon, think real.

Are you a complete morn. Learn to read before you type and you obviously don't know allot about anything, you even contradict yourself in that post. He said that the only reason the PS3 has blu-ray is so that Sony can force it into everyones house to make it the new video standard instead of doing it for games.

It was actually a decent interview, he felt somewhat personable. I feel the Japanese Sony members may sound a little odd as they are having to translate from Japanese to English...and things can come out sounding a little harsh. Oh, and they say crazy things.

As for the Blu-Ray is for gaming argument...it should be apparent that Blu-Ray is being installed to bolster Sony's other divisions, and I can't blame them for trying. But they can't blame me for not buying.

Basically two console companies stayed with dvd technology, and Sony moved ahead because of necessity. So what that says about MS and Nintendo...well, it's obviously not Sony being complimentary. And it may turn out that ultimately Sony was correct, that their games are head and shoulder above the competition, and if that turns out to be the case (and after a price drop or two), I'll happily join in the gaming goodness.

BR isn't for gaming, they've implied it themselves. Are you really gonna hinge onto their marketing lines, they want you to think BR is the only way to get HD graphics. But when you look at Resistances 22gb gameplay you would see that it's a bunch of bull crap. The gameplay looks no better than COD3's. If BR was for gaming you WOULDN'T need a HDD to play games.

All Microsoft has to do is release a 100gb HDD, and Sony's boastful BR attacks won't mean anything. Because whether it's BR or HDD its still STORAGE either way. And because of BR's bad transfer speeds your gonna need both, that's NOT a gaming advantage by a long shot.

80% of the comments here sound like mindless babble and out right crying!!!!!

OH GOD SONY is lieing, They put Blu Ray in for Movies not games

*PS1 CD's, PS2 DVD's, PS3 Blu ray... Ummm see the pattern people.

* You fanboys act like you don't know how Big corp. work? If you cry so much when you "think" you get lied to I hate to meet you in your real life when most people would, have and will do much more than that.

* Grow up, don't you get tired of crying about how Sony "lied" to you everyday.

* more important is why you would even care %70 of you have already stated you don't want a PS3 so it's obvious SONY ISN'T TALKING TO YOU. If you choose to go elsewhere for your gaming that is your right as the customer but don't look over your shoulder crying about it every chance you get. Make you decision and move on with it

Honestly...what are you so angry about? So people harbor a belief that Sony did not implement Blu-Ray solely for games...are you hurt by this?

A gaming forum should be a discussion of thoughts and ideas...and gaming is a constantly changing environment. It could turn out that Sony is right, or wrong...and opinions will change to reflect that.

I just don't like to see this type of anger/frustration over what people think of a gaming console. It's unhealthy.

It's amazing how much anger some of the people here are exerting against a consumer product that they have no intention of buying. What's even more incredible is that they waste their time badmouthing it simply because it has more features, power, and value than the system that either prefer or already purchased.

The PS3 is priced higher than all other next-gen consoles because it has the greatest amount of power and the greatest number of features. And no matter how they like to spin info about blu-ray and make up random B.S., it still doesn't change those facts. It's priced higher due to higher quality and higher value. If you don't like those aspects, don't come crying to us about it. Go to your console of choice and just enjoy it. Then again if you really did enjoy it, you probably wouldn't be wasting your time on sites such as this. But who am I to judge.

Every PS3 title is being pressed onto Blu-ray, and nearly every developer is taking full advantage of the freedom that Blu-ray offers, just as they're taking advantage of the Cell, RSX, and standard Hard Drive. To get angry with developers for taking advantage of the hardware they've been given is just childish. And the people who are pissed about Resistance being 22GB AFTER level compression are going to be furious once the final data size is released (supposedly around 35GB) simply because it makes the 360 look inferior. Doesn't mean that the 360 is a bad console by any means; it just means that it's inferior, and there's no add-on or update in the world that can fix that.

you speak like if you know what you are talking about. Now lets go back to reality for a second. 1) XBox live exist (PS3 online service it's a mistery. 2) XBox 360 has games that you can actually play. 3) People are more exited about the wii and the 360 (everywhere). Multiple polls indicate this and 0 polls indicate otherwise. 4) You can tell the majority of people in this site and most multi-platform sites prefer the 360.

Almost there... I can't wait! I never though I would be looking foward for the release of a console that I may not buy and so far I don't want to buy. But, I'm tired of people expeculating about the PS3. I can't wait for november! Sony's has being selling the PS3 purely on promises; but soon they will have to show the goods.

Well Truth, I'm not one of the "70%" who has already stated I don't want a PS3, so I'm just curious exactly what you think about these statements from Phil. DJ, I completely disagree with your post, but this news was about Phil's comments, your welcome to your opinion, but if you don't mind I would like to ask you and Truth 2 question?

1. My first question is do you really believe what Phil said in this interview, specifically that Blu-ray was implented "purely" for games? Which means the fact that they can play BD's, which is a next gen DVD format backed by Sony(and others)is just a convenient coincedence... so therefore he's just saying its a nice bonus to have but nothing to do with their strategy for getting Blu-ray further implemented into the market?-(at least that was my interpretation of what he said, but if I'm wrong just correct me in your answer, thanks)

2. Do you believe the costs associated with the Blu-ray drive had no effect on the PS3's overall price?

OK, my bad thats actually 3 questions. If anyones paying attention but just bare with me I'm just about done. BTW, Truth of course we have know way of knowing what you sound like or how you truly feel, but your "POST"/comments do "sound" angry...and it has nothing to do with your point of view.....it just "sounds" like your upset about other posts.

1. Blu-ray was put in for games; movie playback is included for free and is completely optional. People would be pissed if they bought a console that uses its disc drive for games, but totally ignores that format's movie capabilities. They'd feel ripped off. If HD-DVD stored more data per layer than Blu-ray, it would have been put in instead. But it doesn't, so Sony chose the format with the highest storage capacity. That was their main concern when they took a look at the demands of next-gen gaming and saw that their developers were already feeling limited by DVD. It's simply the next logical step.

2. The costs of the Blu-ray drive have very little effect on the price of the console, especially considering that the one part that truly differentiates Blu-ray drives from DVD drives is the laser diode. More expensive than DVD drives since it is new technology and Sony is paying for startup manufacturing fees, but those are short-term and go down fairly rapidly as the DVD market proved with the PS2.

If you want to blame the price of the PS3 on something, blame it on the 4 usb ports, the standard hard drive, the gigabit ethernet port, the inclusion of both AV and HDMI ports, the Cell CPU, the RSX GPU, the bluetooth functionality, the XDR RAM, etc.

warner is about to render the format war useless "Warner’s plan is to create a disc with a Blu-ray top layer that works like a two-way mirror. This should reflect just enough blue light for a Blu-ray player to read it okay. But it should also let enough light through for HD-DVD players to ignore the Blu-ray recording and find a second HD-DVD layer beneath.

An ordinary DVD recording could be put on the other side, so that conventional DVD players can read the disc as well.

Although the triple-standard disc will cost more to make, it should still be cheaper than pressing three, and shops should be pleased not to have their shelves overloaded with so many different discs."

so now can everyone shut up about sony forcing a format on you, you don't have to buy blu-ray movies when you get a PS3, you can get an hddvd player and a PS3 just like i have a ps2, a laserdisc player, and a dvd player(not implying hddvd will die like laserdisc just pointing out the you can get different formats even though a game console has one built in).

right ok this makes sense...sony is releasing a new movie format (Blu-ray) remember they already have one failed one, and it just happens to become part of the PS3 from a "gaming perspective" paleeaaasseee whether or not it helps games remains to be seen, but nobody's a fool, this was a way to get the mass market and "their loyal 200 million fanbase" to make their movies standard, theirs no way around it, this is the truth and everyone knows it...

First of all I want to say thanks for the response. Your comments: "Blu-ray was put in for games; movie playback was put in for free and is completely optional."

-I would agree it's for games,(obviously) but given the fact that Sony themselves have suggested(not confirmed)that they may release game bundles with BR movies "for free" shows that they want to push the format into gamers homes.

-Yes BR movie playback comes with the console, but not for "FREE" its part of the overall price, therefore its not optional, and if you don't buy BD's movies, then its just added "extra" expense.

Your Comment: "The costs of the Blu-ray drive have very little to do with the cost of the console...."

-I know its not a standalone player, but when the costs of a standalone player is $1000, its just common sense that the PS3 had to have at least a significant amount of mfg. costs to implement that same tech. in the PS3....even for the cheapest drives, and I know you're not saying that they'll be some cheap garbage drives, are you?

-At least later in your post you admit Blu-ray has added costs vs. DVD's, even though you downplay its significance, now you say Sony is "paying" for start-up mfg. fees, which means Sony has officially stated somewhere that none of the costs associated with Blu-ray are being passed on to the consumer, I definitely didn't know that? If thats true, then I'm wrong on this one and I apologize in advance...can you give me the link where you got this information, please?

And actually, the movie playback is free since the Cell and RSX are powerful enough to do video processing without the need for additional hardware. The disc drive just reads data.

Standalone players cost so much money because they require powerful hardware to decode 1080p video. This function requires a very powerful CPU with dedicated RAM, a motherboard, and all this complicated stuff. The drive apparently costs nowhere near $1000. Even on Sony's website you can buy personal computers with Blu-ray drives, and it's not all that more expensive than if you bought the same computer with a DVD drive.

The PS3 has all those hardware capabilities built in; all that was required was software to run on the PS3 hardware in order to play Blu-ray movies. And like I said, Sony is going to make sure that EVERYONE knows about its Blu-ray capabilities. It's in their best interest to have the format succeed (along with the hundred or so other companies involved with the format). If the format effectively beats out HD-DVD and replaces DVD, then that helps decrease costs across the board and makes their risky investment worthwhile. And since it is the superior disc format, it also benefits consumers to have optimal technology at an affordable price.

About the last part, you must've gotten confused along the line. Let me rephrase that for you. There are a lot of components that contribute to the overall production costs of the PS3, and in the grand scheme of things a Blu-ray drive is not as financially significant as the Cell CPU, RSX GPU, XDR Ram (which was custom-built for Cell), and a slew of other aspects of the system such as the Flex I/O connections and Hard Drive.

Merrill Lynch's best estimate put the PS3 production cost at $800. It's obviously being sold at a significant start-up cost with the promise that the system will become cheaper and cheaper to build over time.

The PS2 supposedly cost $500 to manufacture when it was launched, and many people attributed that cost to the unproven DVD drive technology. True, it was on the market previously, but its adoption rate before the launch of the PS2 was almost nonexistant; people thought Sony was crazy for investing in more Disc Space when most developers were hardly using all of the space on CDs. Same situation, different year.

It was a tactical move on the format front for Sony to sell PS3 with a Blu-ray drive. The plan was for Sony/ Blu-ray to win the format war before it even had a chance to really begin. Sony would have capitalised on the millions from the PS3 fanbase who would already be owning a Blu-ray player if PS3 had launched as initially scheduled. HD-DVD wouldn't have stood a chance then. Thank god that didn't happen, so consumers now have a choice to reject the more expensive Blu-ray format.

I mean how sincere can that comment from Phil be? Sony didn't even know which of the untested formats was going to win, and solely for gaming purposes they decided to go with Blu-ray? Please!

OK, I read your post and I still don't understand your logic, but I do think you make some valid points about standalone players costing alot more because of them needing a CPU with dedicated RAM, etc. and its already included in the PS3 (which Im aware of), but still I think theres a significant portion of money from the research/ development and mfg. cost of the Blu-ray laser itself that translate to a higher priced PS3 for the consumer, but I guess we will have to agree to disagree on the subject because without any hard data(fact sheets) from Sony showing exact figures for everything in the PS3 we are really only guessing. Although I do believe I'm making a educated guess, but in the end its just speculation. History has made me very skeptical of anything Sony say's, without evidence. If you actually believe this, then I will respect your opinion. Agree to disagree. Thanks.

Are you the dumbest sony fanboy so far lmao,trogen horse aka viris in the ps3 u dumb sh{t,he was refering to beta ray worming its way into millions of homes incorperated in the ps3,hense becoming the next gen dvd format,which aint gonna work FONY,your lies have tripped you up one to many times